Relevant Content Increases Your Search Rankings
You know you need more content. Updating the pages on your website and posting new blogs, videos, whitepapers, ebooks and articles keeps users coming back to your site and also increases your search rankings (how far up on the page your website lands when a user searches for your product or service).
But all content is not created equal. Back in the day, search engine optimization (SEO) specialists advocated metrics such as keyword density, the number of times a keyword appears in your content in relation to the number of words on the page. Too much emphasis on this type of metric resulted in page after page of useless content that read like a triple-translated instruction manual.
Google was not having it. As a search engine, Google wants users to have an easier time finding the content they’re looking for — something that’s helpful, that answers a question or solves a problem, in other words, relevant content. In fact, Google has stated that it prioritizes relevance even above the much touted metric of mobile-friendliness. As noted in its blog, “the intent of the search query is still a very strong signal — so even if a page with high quality content is not mobile-friendly, it could still rank well if it has great, relevant content.”
So what is great, relevant content?
Searchengineland.com suggests you ask yourself the following question to asses the quality of your content: “Do you offer real value, something of substance to visitors, that is unique, different, useful and that they won’t find elsewhere?” Like an accidental selfie the answer to this question can reveal difficult truths.
A study of ranking factors listed four characteristics of quality, high-ranking content:
- Semantically comprehensive: Does it make sense and contain keywords within their logical context?
- Long-form: Does it take the time to explain more complicated concepts?
- Media-enriched: Does it contain images, video or audio that contribute to its meaning?
- Easy-to-read: Is it grammatically correct and structurally intuitive?
As in all aspects of online marketing, it’s important to keep your audience in mind and address them directly. As the Content Marketing Institute points out, “There’s no such thing as content that will be relevant to everyone. Relevance is completely audience-dependent.”
Now that you know a little bit more about quality content, stay tuned to a future post to learn about some of the biggest mistakes you can make while writing web content and how to avoid them.
Is it easy to create quality, relevant content? No. Is it worth it? Yes! It’s harder to write quality content, which is why there’s less out there, which is why it will boost your rankings! Luckily, we’re here to help.